I Need You By My Side
by Princess-Of-Stuff
Summary: "I don't just have an on and off button for our relationship, Hermione. I can't stop feeling things on command." Draco and Hermione are going through a... rough patch, and Draco thinks that the only way for him to win her back is by showing her how much he loves her. For the competition by LynxMalfoy, '101 Ways to Say "I Love You".
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: ****Hey there! This story is for a competition (not challenge this time!) called '101 Ways to Say "I Love You"' by LynxMalfoy. This is the 50,000 word multi-chapter that I'd been talking about in other stories :D So, I'm not counting the words for this Author Note, nor will I for the disclaimer or any other un-related things I may write.**

**My prompts were**

_**5.**____**I can't stop thinking about you when we're apart.**_

_**10.**____**I need you by my side.**_

_**78. You sweeten my sour days.**_

_**92. You're my perfect match.**_

_**50. You are precious**_

_**11. I need you.**_

_**99. You're the diamond in the rough**_

_**45. You are my reason for living.**_

_**54. You bring joy to my life.**_

_**13. I value you.**_

**And my character was Hermione Granger! So, of course, I'm doing my favourite couple… Dramione 3**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, however I own this story (because I remember how I wrote this multi-chapter story with my own, exhausted fingers).**

**Please enjoy; I worked my butt off writing this and so I don't want any of you moaning that I didn't write enough.**

_**50,000 words.**_

**All I can say.**

**Well… ENJOY! (This alone is like, a page on Microsoft Word, wow…) Now introducing: I Need You by My Side**

"I need you." It was probably the _first _time that I'd ever heard him beg. And that's what he was doing; he'd been calling me by telephone (and I curse the day I ever taught him how to do that) and asking for me to come back home, and had once even resorted to knocking frantically on my door early one morning.

But this time, I was doing something that I'd never done before. And do you know what that was? Being myself. You see, for the whole time that he had been 'courting' me, I had to be this perfect girl; this beautiful, graceful maiden – someone who made everyone else jealous. And that just really wasn't me, you see? I don't think he saw that. Maybe I should have made him look; maybe things would have been different.

I doubt that, though. As stubborn as his father, and as pertinacious as all of his ancestors, he stood: defiant. Those three words, they rounded him up pretty well: stubborn, pertinacious, and defiant. Those were the three traits I'd come across the most, anyway.

I kept kidding myself, thinking that this whole image of him that I'd concocted was real, but in truth… I didn't know him. He didn't know me. We didn't know anything about each other! We were simply… We were blinded by the simplicity of love. At least, what our _idea _of love was – a fairy-tale, Prince Charming, kind of love.

Perhaps that was the only love that we could happily envelope without a doubt in our minds. Perhaps the ruthless, feral claws of real love were too much for us to handle, and we just shrouded ourselves in the protective, fabricated duvet of an untrue love. And it was okay, and it was comfortable, but it wasn't real.

It wasn't real, and that's why I fled. But now that he was saying those three dreaded words…

"I need you."

It's hysterical, how much three words can mean to a person. Whether they are, "I value you," or "I love you," or "I was wrong," they all mean so much to a person, and they can be life-changing.

"I need you."

I could, like any ordinary woman, laugh those three words off, and pretend that they mean nothing – but I'm not an ordinary woman. The fact that I was renowned as the 'Brightest Witch of Her Age' even though I was Muggle-born… Just the simple thought that I had charmed a Slytherin boy into my Gryffindor clutches; it all made me so unlike all those other, ordinary woman.

So I could _not _just laugh them off.

I could become angry, annoyed and aggravated at how he only wanted me after I had left; I could become a devastated wreck of tears, deeper than the ocean… But I didn't.

I oppressed my jumbled emotions, and smiled through my almost-tears. I choked back the anger that was rising like bile in my throat, and I spoke clearly through the speaker of the phone:

"I need you."

As much as I hated the fact that it was wrong, and that I shouldn't need him – after all, we were on a temporary break – I couldn't help the overwhelming sense of loss that I felt whenever I heard him speak. And for once, I wasn't going to let that feeling stay unspoken. Today, I wanted to tell Draco how much I really _did _care.

At once, the phone blurs with electric static, and I ponder to myself what on earth had happened, when I heard the familiar _bzzt _of my mobile.

"Hello?" I ask, even though the frenetic breathing shortens the list of people in my mind.

"Hermione?" A husky voice asks back, the breathing still laboured and uneven. "I… I don't know what happened." I simply smile wryly, even though he can't see me, and after a short pause he continues, "Shock, I guess." From his tone, he sounds as awry as I would have imagined him to be. I guess some things never change.

"Right." I nod – even though yet again, I have remind myself, he cannot see me. "Any particular reason you decided to call me? _Again_?" I knew exactly the reason, but I'm going to torture him until he admits everything I want to know. One of the things being, what he was really feeling at the moment. He can't actually miss me; it's out of the question. I don't miss him, he doesn't miss me. It works, just like a formulated maths question, or an intellectual puzzle with an obvious answer. It _works_.

"Hermione…" His deep, rich voice sighs flatly. "You know why I called you. You know the reason to every phone call I have made to you for the last week." He says in a monotone voice, sounding rather dreary and fed up.

"Do I?" I reply, because I really want a real answer instead of the half-ones that he's trying to feed me. "_Please_," I state smoothly. "Do tell."

I can hear his vexed voice, exasperated and unsure of what to say. _Tell me that you miss me_, I find myself thinking, and I flinch at the almost… _desperate_, tone that rings out of my head but luckily not out of my mouth.

"Don't make this more difficult than it needs to be. I need you, Hermione." There. He's said it. I'm not sure why I'm so satisfied – maybe it's just because I knew he was going to say it at one point – but I think that, subconsciously, I just wanted to hear how he really felt.

If he's being honest, then I want to be honest too. "I need you, too," I retort sharply, "But it doesn't mean that I'll come round your house at five in the morning to wake you up."

It's strange, but it's almost as if I can _hear _him wince through the phone, and he sighs (which he seems to be doing a lot of in this phone call) and responds, "You wouldn't consent to me breaking down your door, so it was the next best thing."

"_Break down my door?_ Merlin, do you know how deranged you sound?" I snap, scrunching my finely-sculpted eyebrows together into a tight knot right above my eyes.

"No more than the next dumped-without-a-reason boyfriend, I'd imagine." He comments dryly, and my victorious smirk falters slightly when I hear the defeated note in his drawl. "And for your information, I would have just blasted it open, but then you'd make me pay for it."

"You have enough money to have been able to pay for a new one." I remark with suspicion. It's true; his Malfoy inheritance was bountiful, and he obtained large amounts of Galleons when he finally become the correct age.

He lingers for a little too long before admitting, "I just didn't want another reason for you to hate me." My heart slightly melts at that, although not enough to just suddenly exclaim that I wanted him back. Because I didn't – not right now.

"You know? I could never hate you. Loathe you, dislike you… But never hate." I murmur softly. I hate it when I become this vulnerable; he seems to bring this exposed state of me out more than anyone else. "Once, I would have told you that you're my perfect match. Maybe you still are. I just need time, Draco."

"But… I just can't stop thinking about you when we're apart." He mumbles pathetically, and I almost feel sympathetic for him until I realise that I'm not meant to feel anything – especially pity – for him. It's his fault, not mine, that we're in this mess.

Or is it? Maybe it _was _both of us. We may have equally added to this mess… I just hate it when the blame is on me. I hate it when people glare at me as if I ruined the world – it was just our relationship, and I don't understand why people hated me so much for taking a break from him.

That was always one of the reasons I was wary, actually. Draco had so many fan-girls, so many adoring girls waiting outside our house or near his workplace. It overwhelmed me, because he received the same attention that Harry did, and he was _Harry Potter_. He saved the world. What has Draco done, apart from being handsome and attractive and wealthy? It was the wealth that drew them in, statistically, although the face and body were great additions to the deal. They always hated me because I had him, and they didn't. It was as simply stupid as that.

"Draco." I sigh moodily. "Please. Don't start this again." He gets so melodramatic, honestly. I bet he doesn't think about me when he's drinking milk. See? So he doesn't think about me as much as he says he does. At least, I _think_ he doesn't think about me when he drinks milk… I hope he doesn't, actually.

"I don't just have an on and off button for our relationship, Hermione. I can't stop feeling things on command." He interjects, and while he's right on one point, on another – he could at least stop acting upon those feelings.

"I never said you needed one. All I'm saying is, you don't need to jump on every impulse you get, okay? You need to stop behaving like a child." My speech is becoming slightly muffled now, because of the bad reception I'm getting, and I'm slightly afraid that our connection could instantly become disjoint.

"I'm not behaving like a child; children don't feel this kind of love that I feel for you." He's becoming really sappy now, and it's making me uncomfortable; nevertheless, I listen to what he's about to say (I know he's going to start talking again because he's taking a deep intake of breath) and then I hear the faint click of a button before silence.

Just in case he's fooling around, I whisper, "Draco?" But there's no answer, reliving my suspicion that our phone call has been cut off.

Whimpering slightly in the sudden cold air the surrounds me, I collapse onto my nearby, leathery couch with a thud. "I guess I could take a quick nap." I stretch out quickly, settling into a snug position before shutting my eyes and blocking out the violent sunlight that is streaming in through my cream curtains.

"I need you." I pule querulously, and I gape in astonishment because those words just slipped out by accident. I frown, ashamed of my actions, and try to settle back into my favoured dream-world – the one where everyone happens the way I want it, and where Draco and I live peacefully in coexistence.

That's why it's my dream-world.

It'd never happen in real life.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Okay so, this is going to be short (the author's note) so… Here we're going to meet Harry and Ginny, the cute couple who are totally in love. Queue Hermione's jealousy :D**

**ENJOY!**

I don't know why I agreed to meet them. I honestly don't, seeing as I'm sitting here all by my lonesome, while they whisper endearing words into each other's ears and feed each other cake. Which is a big contrast to me; shoving barrowful's of cheesecake down my throat in an attempt to conceal how unhappy I'm feeling.

Ever since that phone call (it's only been a day, but I can't stop thinking about it) I've been feeling lost; a sheep away from its herd; frightened, alone, and unsure of itself. I've had this feeling – deep, deep down in the bottom of my stomach – that I'd done something wrong. Perhaps if I hadn't been so harsh…

_No! _I scream inside my head furiously. _You deserved a break from all the heart-ache. _But did I? I doubt it, but somehow… I feel like I enjoyed our relationship. As crazy as it seems, maybe I _did _enjoy the rampaging arguments and the caressing, tender moments that came after.

But then a voice, concerned for my well-being, interrupts my preposterous pondering. "Hermione? Are you okay?" I peer curiously over to the voice, which belongs to a fiery red-headed girl: Ginny. "You looked a little spaced out. What's up?"

I smile sheepishly, scratching my head to dispel any lingering thoughts about Draco. What's up, indeed… I don't even know anymore. I thought that I had everything planned out – I would become defiant, I would leave Draco, and I would feel no remorse whatsoever.

However… I do feel remorse. I feel sorry for leaving Draco, and I feel my defiance slipping out of my fingertips every time I think of him. As foolish as it sounds… I miss him.

I miss his teasing taunts, and the way he could make me smile so easily; the cooked breakfasts he brought me every morning without fail, made lovingly with his own hands. I can't just forget every single memory we made, even though I wish I could. But then, I couldn't tell Ginny that, or even Harry. They would both think that I was stupid for thinking it; that I was becoming soft and forgiving, when I wasn't.

But what to say? Should I make up an excuse? _What would the excuse be? _Should I pretend everything is fine? _But nothing is fine. _Should I tell her the truth? _No, because she would think you were foolish._

I cough, trying to gain some time so I could think of something to say. Ginny stares at me suspiciously, and I smile brightly to appease her. "I'm fine, Ginny. I'm just feeling a bit… under the weather, is all." I explain to her. It's not the best of excuses, but it'll do for now.

Straight away, she frowns in an attempt to appear concerned, instead of eager to know why. "Oh dear, Hermione…" She looks at Harry, who looks more interested in my well-being than Ginny. "Do you know what it is that's bothering you?"

I bite back a snarky remark that went something like: _No, something's bothering me but I have no clue what it is or why it's bothering me._ "Did I ever mention that something was bothering me?" I raise an eyebrow incredulously.

Ginny laughs, unfazed. "I've known you for a long time, Hermione. I'd like to think that I'd know if something was bothering or upsetting you." She grins gently, attempting to nudge my shoulder but failing. "Now. Tell me what's bothering you, before I force it out of you instead."

I hold in a laugh and reply, "Aren't you already forcing it out of me? I mean, it's not like I'm willingly going to tell you."

"Oh Hermione, you've always been the smart one, haven't you?" I nod; it's true, I _am _pretty clever. "Well stop." I blink, surprised. "I want you to stop following your brain, and start using your heart instead. I can tell you're upset about the whole 'Draco' thing, but you're confused."

I sigh, closing my eyes and allowing my mind to rest for a second. "If you knew, then why did you ask?" I ask, as the thought crosses my mind. I know, my mind was meant to be resting, but… It's hard. I can't _not _think. It's a part of me, like an instinct, and it's really confusing when I don't have facts to rely on.

The reality is… To me, facts reside over feelings. Feelings are complicated, and can hurt you; facts are true and never lie. It's just… easier, that way.

"Because," Ginny begins matter-of-factly, flipping her vibrant orange hair over her shoulders dramatically. "I thought it'd be more dramatic than just saying, 'Oh, hey, you're upset about Draco'."

Sometimes I worry about this girl. Actually, scrap that – I worry about this girl _all the time._ I shrug my shoulders. "But that _is _the basis of what's wrong with me."

She tuts seriously, like an old woman scolding a young child. "_Honestly_, Hermione, you have no class."

"Says the woman who snogged her boyfriend in public." I retort quickly. "_Honestly_, Ginny," I imitate her voice to perfection, "You have no class."

I hear a chuckle, and remember that Harry is sitting diagonally to me. "But it was a good snog, I'll give her that." He winks at Ginny flirtatiously. "For a woman with no class."

Ginny screeches, catching the attention of literally everyone in the café, but she ignores them and goes on to 'attack' her boyfriend. I say attack, but… She's so weak it's like he's being hit with a pillow. He doesn't even flinch as her pale fists come in contact with his upper chest.

"Ginny, someone might call the police in a minute." I warn her. "They don't know that really, you're as weak as a new-born kitten." I stifle a laugh as she tries to injure me from across the table with a deathly glare. Luckily, though, she heeds my warning and stops trying to hurt Harry.

"Thanks, darling - it's nice to know you care." Harry says sarcastically, rubbing his chest in a mock attempt to pretend that it hurt.

"Oh, honey, you know I care." Ginny smiles soothingly, snuggling into his chest as he smiles. He wraps his arm tightly around her comfortingly, and she giggles as he kisses her head lovingly.

They're in their own bubble now – their own bubble of love. I wish I had something like that; you know, when you're just _so _in love with someone, that you'd do anything for them: swim through an ocean, dive into a volcano, or even take a bullet (or Avada Kedavra) for them, all in an instance.

I bet I'll never have that – I'll never have someone to love me. Draco could say whatever, but in all honesty it wouldn't make me budge. I don't deserve to be loved, I don't deserved to be cared for; I don't _have _anyone to love me, or care for me, but it's all the same thing in my mind.

And I trust my mind to know what's right and wrong.

I stare enviously at them as I see what could've become of Draco and I; if only… If only we'd tried harder to make amends every time we fought or argued, instead of piteously whining to our friends every day.

I shake my head: no. It's all well and good, saying 'what if', but it's not going to change anything. It's all in the past, and… I've moved on.

_But what if you said sorry?_

I don't need to say sorry – I haven't done anything that he hasn't, and so if _he _won't apologise, then _I _won't either.

_But what if he said sorry?_

If he said- _No! _He won't say sorry; he won't, he never will, he _can't._ He can't because then it'd ruin things and everything would be back to normal…

_Except it wouldn't_, that annoying voice in my head reasons with me. _It would make things better._ _Your life would be better with Draco._

And it would, I suppose. Not entirely better, but more bearable.

I look at Harry and Ginny again, and see how happy they are together; my heart pangs with remorse as I realise that could've been me with Draco.

"Oh, 'Mione, I'm so sorry. We forgot… I mean, we…" Ginny stumbles over her words, trying to make them sound as nice as possible.

"It's okay, Ginny. You're in love. You're married. You forgot me, no big deal." I give a big, fat, _fake _smile to calm her down.

Ginny shares a look with Harry, and I instantly recognise it – it's the look that says, 'should we tell her?' and I'm worried straight away.

"What? What is it?" I ask cautiously.

Ginny sighs, rubs her eyes tiredly, and says: "That's not it, Hermione. I mean, we're in love." She smiles, looking at Harry. "We're married." She shows me her platinum ring, and it glints in the unpredictable sunlight. "But…" She audibly gulps.

"Hey, darling, we can tell her." Harry smiles. "She's our best friend, after all. We can count on her." Yes, everyone can count on me. It's what I do, I suppose…

"Right." Ginny nods, smiling. "Hermione… I'm expecting." She defiantly stares at me, waiting for me to judge her.

I'm guessing that she didn't expect me to jump out of my seat hurriedly, lunge my arms out at her, and pull her in for a humongous hug. "Ginevra Molly Potter!" I scream happily. "I'm so excited!" And I am – I love babies to bits, because ever since I was little I've wanted to be a mother. But I guess I'll have to settle for being-

"And you're the godmother, obviously!"

…godmother?

My arms limp lifelessly to my sides, and I stare at her in astonishment.

…godmother?

She stares back at me, her lips in a straight line.

…godmother?

Harry stares at us, probably worried for our well-being.

Godmother!

"Godmother!" I squeal, and she grins widely as we envelope each other in our arms.

I'm still anxious about Draco, but this news has made me _so _happy! I'm going to be godmother – I'm going to spoil this little munchkin to within an inch of his or hers life!

"Have you got any names in mind?" I ask, when we've quietened down – it was only after the excitement had cooled down, that I'd realised we'd captured quite the audience. Over half of the members of the café were staring at us in bewilderment, but I shushed them with a beaming smile.

Ginny laughs, stealing a quick kiss off of Harry before answering me. "If it's a girl, Lily Luna…"

"But if it's a boy, James Sirius." Harry adds, smiling as well.

"Those are both lovely names," I comment. "I love them."

"We do too." Ginny says smugly. "But anyway… What are you going to do about Draco?"

At once, my excitement dies down, and I get that familiar heartache that I've become accustomed to. I stare into the distance, and a serious atmosphere lies upon us suddenly like a heavy blanket. "_I don't know_." I mutter softly; helplessly.

The sun starts to fade, rather like any reasoning in my brain that is telling me to forget all about Draco. The clouds run away, like the judgement I once had on my heart. The blue of the sky stares at me, like Draco's eyes. And suddenly… _I know._


End file.
